


thunder and lightning

by aircaliburs



Series: the dreams we never knew we had [2]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, During Canon, F/F, Graphic Depictions of Illness, I promise, Pre-Canon, Soulmates, wlw
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:28:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28422435
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aircaliburs/pseuds/aircaliburs
Summary: In which Shamir has migraines and nightmares, which always precede something terrible befalling Catherine.
Relationships: Catherine/Shamir Nevrand
Series: the dreams we never knew we had [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2081772
Kudos: 8





	thunder and lightning

**Author's Note:**

> (1/2/2021: made minor updates bc i forgot some canon things)  
> Hello! Happy New Year!!! 
> 
> This was going to be a follow-up the other soulmates AU I did, but ended up being a lot longer... I think I have two more chapters drafted out already? I'm doing the thing where I draft on paper and then transfer to digital for revision (and then post, revise again, repost, revise... orz). 
> 
> I hope no one has used this title for Cathmir fic already... if so im sorry :S
> 
> CW: illness, mentions of violence and death, canon character death

As a child, Shamir would spontaneously fall ill from time to time. It was rarely severe — she would vomit in the dirt while chasing her brothers and just go on playing after, wake up with a nosebleed (on her birthday, of all days), wince in pain when a migraine struck her while she washed the dishes, among other episodes of aching ears, nausea, trembling fingers, and cramps, though headaches seemed to be the most common affliction she experienced. Her parents did not think much of it. It was all normal, wasn’t it? Children got sick frequently. And the way the children constantly complained about one hitting the other, _of course_ Shamir ended up having so many headaches. This happened more often to her than her brothers, but Shamir’s parents assured her it was only a consequence of her “feminine constitution.” 

This upset Shamir. She didn’t know why bouts of illness befell her so often, but she _was_ strong. She was a better hunter than her brothers (she always brought the most pelts home to their father) and was more athletic than all of them. Being doted on when she was ill irritated her the most, and as she grew older, she learned to ignore her symptoms (or at least, put on a facade that she was well).

Shamir would leave home when she was thirteen. It was not so much a protest to her parent’s declarations that she was a fragile little girl as much as it was a decision based on the unfortunate fact that there were too many mouths to feed and not enough food to go around, with her parents and younger siblings and grandmother all reliant on her father’s earnings from the tannery for survival. It was better if Shamir earned her own living. She joined a band of mercenaries by impressing them with her archery skills, and that was that. For once, Shamir was never uncertain about her next meal or whether or not she could afford a new pair of boots when hers fell apart. She was living comfortably, even though her work was demanding. Exciting, but remarkably stressful and demanding. 

The most irritating part of her work wasn’t even her battles with ruffians and bandits, however; it was the incessant teasing she faced as a consequence of her sudden bouts of illness. “Sicky Shamir” became her new nickname after she’d been feeling unwell but went to help the captain groom her horse anyway, which ended in her throwing up on the mare’s freshly brushed mane. Shamir hated it. Especially because her crush — another mercenary who wasn’t much older than her, who had storm-grey eyes and a crooked smile — was in on it as well. He never even called her by her name, only “Sicky” or “Barfy.” And of course, it was all the more amusing because of how flustered Shamir got every time he did it. 

It became less amusing one day, a year or so after Shamir joined the crew, when the grey-eyed boy asked her if she wanted to go to market with him. Shamir had been feeling a tad unwell all day — just a tad nauseous, a tad achy, a tad fearful that something dreadful was about to happen — but she ignored it and took her crush up on his offer. 

They went out, and it was like any other day. They were camped near a coastal town, and the market smelled of the salty sea breeze and fresh fish, and the damp air clung to Shamir’s skin and hair. She recalled little more than that of their excursion. The next thing she knew, she was laying in a bed with a cold towel on her head. Fiery pain beat in her temples, and nausea rocked her stomach much worse than it had in the morning. 

“Thank gods you’re awake.” 

Shamir slowly, carefully, turned her head to see the grey-eyed boy sitting in a wooden chair at her bedside. 

It took more effort than she expected to move her lips. “What happened?” she managed. 

“You threw up the contents of your stomach — and then some — on the street. Then you passed out,” he explained. He leaned forward in his seat, resting his elbows on his knees. “I grabbed you so you wouldn’t hit the floor, and I could feel through your clothes that you were burning up. So I asked for the nearest doctor, and here we are.”

She still felt woozy and barely understood anything besides the last thing he said. “A _doctor_? You should have just taken me back to camp, this — “

“Taking you here may have saved your life, Sicky. I stand by my decision. I’d rather not think about what would have happened if you hadn’t gotten medicine any sooner.” 

Shamir tried to scoff, but in her state of weakness, she could only manage a quick huff through her nose. “It couldn’t have been that bad.”

“The doctor said she’d never seen anything like it.” Though his voice had been low and calm, it cracked now. Shamir could hear his worries creep into his tone. “Your fever spiked so high — and out of nowhere, too! — she was worried you’d have permanent damage to your body. They had to give you the strongest cooling herbs and hydrating draughts they had. Had to restrain you, too. You started writhing and muttering like you were having a nightmare.” 

“Muttering?” She had never spoken in her sleep before — surely, if she did, the mercs she shared a tent with would have teased her for it. “What did I say?”

“You were barely intelligible. All I could make out was something like ‘no, don’t go, please.’ You know, nightmare-sounding stuff.”

“Oh. I don’t remember dreaming, though.”

“Must be a good thing. It sounded like the kind of dream you’d rather not remember.”

“Yeah.” Shamir turned her head back to face the ceiling. 

They remained in the clinic a while longer as Shamir regained her strength. She took a short nap after waking up the first time, and afterward, she was coherent enough to take in her setting. She was laying in one bed in a row of ten — definitely a hospital. (Unfortunately, she hadn’t imagined her partner telling her that.) There were a few other patients, people who’d broken an arm or eaten week-old fish, and the room buzzed with their conversations. A line of windows on the wall behind her told her that it was afternoon now. Her bag sat on the floor beside her bed, and her jacket was hung on the bedpost. 

She sat up. The doctor, whose name Shamir was never able to remember, came by and gave her another potion and the instruction to drink water. The grey-eyed boy stayed with her all the while. He wasn’t worried about telling the captain where they had disappeared to all day — he’d tell her when they returned to camp, he said. 

When Shamir was able to get out of bed, she grabbed her bag from the floor and pulled out her coin pouch. Staying in a clinic all day was bound to cost a fair amount. She still wished her partner had just taken her back to camp but didn’t want to argue with him. 

She peered into her purse to see how much gold she had on her. Hopefully, the doctor would let her return and pay the rest of the bill later…

“What are you doing?” asked the grey-eyed boy.

Shamir looked up at him, eyes narrowed. “I need to pay the doctor _somehow_.”

“No, you don’t”

“What?”

“I paid the bill already.”

“What?... Don’t joke around.” Shamir rolled her eyes and closed her purse. 

“Really! I did.”

“Sure.” She started walking away from the bed, looking for the doctor. “As if you carry enough on you to pay a medical bill.” 

Shamir felt his hand grab her arm, stopping her. He pulled around to face her and said, more seriously and quietly than before, “I’m not lying. I took care of it. Why would I hang you out to dry like that?”

“Because doctors are damned expensive, and I’m not your responsibility!” Shamir replied. But she was distracted now. The person she’d been infatuated with for over a year was now so close to her, _holding her_ , staring into her with those soft grey eyes. Warmth spread from her chest to her head, coloring her cheeks.

“...Are you upset?”

“No… not really. Just, why did you do this?”

He gave her his classic, crooked smile. “Probably because I’m in love with you, Shamir.”

The warmth in her cheeks intensified. “You’re in love with me?”

“Oops. Probably not the best idea to drop that on you when you’re unwell, huh.”

“No, it’s fine.” Shamir smiled in return. “I’m just happy that you feel the same way I do.”

Shamir and her love entered a sweet, young romance that, as the years passed, grew into something deeper and more passionate than Shamir imagined it could be. He was her first love, first person who really understood her and the first person she really understood. She doubted she’d be able to live without him, her partner, and dreamed of being able to leave the mercenary crew one day and start a life of their own. 

That dream made it all the more tragic that her partner would die six years later in the war and Shamir would have to keep living nonetheless. 

* * *

The war began in Guardian Moon of 1175 and, by late spring, had destroyed nearly all of what Shamir had once called home. Somehow she'd survived, though her wounds were great. Her partner and most of her crew were dead. Nearly every farm and village and city had been razed to the ground. As far as Shamir’s family was concerned, she didn’t dare contemplate how they had fared. 

By Garland Moon, still, the stacks of war casualties had not been tended to. And with the heat and humidity of summer irritating the rotting corpses, it seemed that the entire country reeked of death. Even in the few towns that had fared well through the war, the stench lingered, a constant reminder of the countless souls lost. 

Shamir realized that she couldn’t remain in Dagda any longer. 

She cut her hair and boarded a ship with other refugees bound for Brigid, but after spending a week on one of the isles, realized that the neighboring country was ruined, too. Not as physically ruined as Dagda, but Brigid had put so much of their resources into the war that most of the citizens were now penniless or widowed or both. There wasn't any work for a mercenary in a land that couldn't pay her. So she boarded another ship.

Faerghus was her new destination, the land north of Adrestia where Dagdan immigrants were slightly more likely to be treated with respect than they were in the south. Shamir had the advantage of being light-skinned for a Dagdan, as well as having picked up the language of Fodlan in her years as a mercenary. She had trouble mastering it — it was a much rougher, more guttural language than Dagdan. But once she could ditch her accent, she’d be able to pass as a native Fodlan.

More than just her haircut and new language, Shamir was nothing like the person she was before the war. She knew this, was nearly willing to admit it if there was anyone left to admit it to. 

She felt less now. She didn’t want to feel — she wanted to leave her heart behind, buried in the graves of the war dead. She was certainly sad, angry, mourning, scared, but she didn’t _feel_ those feelings. Didn’t express it. Once her tears were dried, once she boarded that filthy, crowded ship, she was no longer the easily-embarrassed yet sharp-tongued girl she’d been with her family, with her crew, with her partner. She was simply surviving. She focused on action, on what her next move would be. 

Her next move after reaching the west coast of Faerghus was to wander the continent and pick up mercenary jobs. She never did get as steady an income as she did with her crew, though. And as she traveled, following the Adrestian border eastward, she got less and less work. She knew part of it was because of her injuries. They never were tended to as well as they should have — all Shamir had done was wrap her cuts and take vulneraries — so she was crossing Faerghus with a limp and a broken nose that got worse with time. No one in their right mind would hire a merc who looked like they'd been trampled by a horse. With each passing week, she had less to live on. She was broke, hungry, and weak. And then, in late autumn, she found herself in the mountains.

 _Surely, some little highland village needs a mercenary, a hunter, even,_ she thought. But instead, she wound up at Garreg Mach. And when she asked if they needed a mercenary, she was hired, full-time, as a knight. 

It was a kind woman, the archbishop Rhea, who knighted her. She'd even healed her injuries with some kind of white magic Shamir hadn't seen before. Shamir knew little of the Church of Seiros before then, having only heard of it in passing as she traversed Fodlan, but opted to serve them in return for their kindness when she was destitute. And it was a reliable paycheck. If all she needed to do was survive, then joining the Knights of Seiros was her most viable next step. 

In all this time, her sudden illnesses had grown much more manageable. Perhaps it was because she’d grown older and stronger (and overcame the “feminine constitution” her parents claimed she had), or Rhea's magic had healed that, too, or she’d been allergic to something in the Dagdan air that wasn’t present in Fodlan, but whatever the reason, the worst sickness she got was the occasional migraine or stomach ache. 

But in the spring after she came to the monastery, she had a much worse, much stranger bout of illness than she’d had in quite a while. 

She was on her way back to her quarters to retire for the night when the migraine hit. She nearly collapsed from the pain. It was sharp and hot and all around her head. She thought she’d been hit by a spell or curse, but there were no mages around to attack her. 

Trembling, Shamir continued to her quarters, where she immediately took a vulnerary from the cupboard and gulped it down. This helped ease the pain a little. But since she still felt awful, with nausea rising in her stomach and sweat beading on her neck and pain throbbing in her head, she decided to take a sleeping draught as well. She drank it faster than she should have and then laid on her bed, barely remembering to remove her boots. She wanted to sleep off the pain and sickness, to drift away into the sensation of nothingness.

That did not happen. 

When Shamir slept, she dreamed of a blonde-haired woman who carried a seven-branched sword. Shamir could only see her from the back.

_Can’t you see? This is going to end horribly._

Shamir was worried. But over what?

_They’re all going to turn against you._

The woman with the sword kept walking, her stride holding the conviction of a warrior. But Shamir knew something awful was about to happen, something tragic, something…

She awoke and immediately vomited on the floor beside her.

“...Too many drugs,” she muttered, and got out of bed to clean up after herself. She spent the rest of the following day out of commission, nearly bedridden by migraine and fever. 

She wondered about her dream, if it was a random flash in her mind or if it really meant something. It really should have been one of those weird dreams (perhaps nightmare was the more accurate term, based on how it had left Shamir feeling) that sank to the depths of Shamir’s memory, but it remained in her mind instead. The image of the woman replayed itself in her thoughts. In a way, the whole incident was similar to when she’d collapsed in the city street all those years ago. She’d had a nightmare and awful illness concurrently then as well, but then again, she’d had all sorts of nightmares lately — none of which she wanted to recall. None of which included the woman with the seven-branched sword, either. 


End file.
